Backseat Window
by Sweetie Amoeba
Summary: "Close your eyes, Johnny," you said, and he obeyed. (Oneshot)


After sex he curls up into a little ball and doesn't speak to you until you drop him off at his house. It is the single most run-down house you've ever seen—worse than the Curtis's, even. The light is on in the kitchen and you can tell he doesn't want to go in there.

"We're here, Johnny" you say, and he looks straight ahead for a few seconds before kissing you once and leaving. He looks so out-of-place in your Corvette but he sure as hell doesn't feel out of place.

You are probably the soc-iest girl in your high school, in all of Tulsa maybe, and recently you've been starting to resent that because it makes you feel guilty. Guilty even though it isn't your fault. You were born into wealth and you grew up with it, it wasn't a choice you made.

Even inside your mind, this sounds weak and somehow untrue. Vanity really is a choice.

You're out with Bob but you can't bring yourself to care about what he's saying. Him and Randy are guffawing about something. Marcia is your best friend and you can't say any of it to her.

You first met Johnny Cade at school and for months that was the only place you saw him. You were the only soc who even glanced his way, let alone spoke to him. He was so gorgeous and boyish, just _innocent_ in a way that your friends didn't appreciate.

You'd share your lunch with him and he started following you around like a lost puppy. Every day after school he'd wait with Ponyboy in the parking lot until Soda came in his car and drove them away. When he was absolutely sure no one was looking, he'd wave goodbye from the backseat window.

Bob didn't mind. He knew you'd never actually do anything with Johnny. He was so sure.

Marcia said to you in the school gym: "Oh, the things I'd do to him if he wasn't a hood."

You kissed him that night. He and Soda and Darry were watching Ponyboy compete in a track meet. You were there with Marcia because you had nothing better to do.

He looked at you like he worshipped you. Dark eyes gleaming and you could smell him, that dusty warm smell that clung to his jacket and hair.

"_Cherry..."_

You were away from the crowd and you had him up against the brick gym wall. "Close your eyes, Johnny." you said, and he obeyed.

A week later you finally had your way with him, in the back of your Corvette parked in the unlit parking lot of a movie house. You'd only ever slept with Bob before. You were Johnny's first. You remember how he gasped your name, trembling with a clenched jaw.

After sex he curls up into a little ball and you feel like you've committed a horrible crime, not just because you're cheating on Bob, not just because he's a hood and your parents would kill you if they found out. Mostly because Johnny seems hurt. Hurt and scared.

It's kept a secret from everyone and you know this because when you see him with his gang at the drive-in movie, you pretend not to know each other. It's been a secret from the beginning. When Ponyboy starts flirting with you, you play along. Johnny doesn't say anything. There's nothing to say, really. But even so, he's looking at you like you might explode at any second.

You find out the next day that Bob is dead. Stabbed during the night by what Marcia calls "a couple of greasers" and found the next morning lying in a pool of his own blood. It's such a trajedy, for his friends and family and for you. But you know he was asking for it. You cry for hours.

Johnny is missing. He isn't at school for at least a week and you figure out what happened on your own. You feel empty and resigned. Kids at school hug you and say that Bob is in a better place now, and you doubt it. You learn that Johnny is back in Tulsa, in the hospital with severe burns, and no matter how you try, you can't bring yourself to visit him. There are things you never said to him, heard him say to you, but you try desperately to keep it all in.

You talk to Ponyboy and it makes you even sadder and when Johnny dies you lock yourself in your room and sleep for eighteen hours. Your parents bring you cookies and milk, they stoke your hair and speak to you in hushed voices. They think you're sad about Bob. For hours, all you can do is sob _"I'm sorry...I'm sorry..."_

You go to his funeral and for weeks after that you have dreams about making love to him in a gold-sheeted bed. You hate yourself for that.

Your car still smells like him and you wish you were dead.


End file.
